


tonight, it's only you and me

by the_sound_of_inevitability



Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everybody Lives, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Kyle Reese lives, Slight Aliens crossover, but not really
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:07:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27354706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_sound_of_inevitability/pseuds/the_sound_of_inevitability
Summary: Kyle Reese has survived his wounds from the final battle with the terminator, but is now adrift in time with nothing to guide him to the future.Except for Sarah Connor.But the future is not set. Will his presence in the past upset the balance of fate?(Of course it won't - but I do love to write them together!)
Relationships: Sarah Connor & Kyle Reese, Sarah Connor/Kyle Reese
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I awoke one morning from a dream where Sarah and Kyle were driving into the desert after the events of _The Terminator_. In the words of Briony Tallis, I wanted to give them both what they lost out on in life.

She's there every time he wakes up.

More often than not, she's holding his hand. The first two times he opens his eyes, she pulls her hand back, so Kyle has learned to pretend to sleep a little longer. Her skin is soft, and warm. Occasionally her thumb will brush over his knuckles and send a pleasant shiver down his spine. Now that the terminator has been destroyed, Kyle can afford to bask in Sarah's presence. For so long, she was just an image. He can't quite believe that he is still here.

* * *

A week ago, he was standing in 2027. The squad that John had assembled to infiltrate the time displacement sector was small – seven of them, including John and Kyle. They had cut through five T-800s to get to the control centre. They were almost too easy to dispatch. With no defence grid, Skynet was unable to co-ordinate a proper counterattack, and many machines defaulted to their basic programming.

Termination.

By the time the squad arrived in the control centre, the air was thick with ozone. A terminator lay on the floor near the entrance. No visible damage, but its eyes had gone dark.

Vasquez walked over, placed one big boot on its chest chassis, and fired a round into its CPU. Just to be sure.

“An EMP,” John said. “Another one has gone through. Where to, Hudson?”

Hudson had patched into the displacement mainframe, face lit by the green glow of information coming from the database.

“Los Angeles, sir,” he said. “1984.”

John nodded. He started to walk slowly around the central dais, where the terminator had only barely eluded them by jumping in to the past.

“The war is nearly over, soldiers.” he said. His voice sounded sad, though his words brought grins to his soldiers' faces. “Our attack on their defence grid has been highly successful. Another fully-powered assault will wipe these fuckers out, and the sun will shine on a new Earth tomorrow. Our Earth.”

The soldiers stayed silent, transfixed by hope and this vision of a new world. A vision of peace.

“But,” John looked up, and for a second his eyes met Kyle's directly. “One of you will not see that day. Hudson?”

Hudson looked up, alarmed. “Sir?”

“Get the displacement unit back up and running.”

“Where to, sir?”

“The same time and place as that terminator. Los Angeles, 1984.”

Hudson bent over the control terminal, fingers typing furiously. John resumed his walk around the room.

“Skynet,” he said, “has sent a terminator to 1984 Los Angeles to kill my mother.”

Kyle felt his stomach flip. In 2027, Sarah Connor was long dead. But Skynet used the displacement unit to punch a hole from the _now_ to the _then_.

Sarah Connor is alive. Exists. Lives. Breathes. In 1984.

But not for long.

“In 1984, there are no plasma rifles. No EMPs. No arsenal to call upon. The terminator who shows up in that time will have a clear run at my mother. She will be outmatched, helpless, and afraid. She needs protection.”

Kyle's pulse skipped a beat.

John paused, and cleared his throat.

“I'd like -”

“Sir, I'll go.” Kyle's voice was steady, even though his heart was hammering.

John smiled, though his eyes were sad.

“Thank you, Sergeant.”

He stripped off his uniform in the hallway. Hudson had been able to glean that much from the control panel.

“Nothing dead, Sergeant. You have to go as naked as the day you were born. Hopefully it's warmer in 1984.”

Kyle passed his uniform to Vasquez, who divvied it out among the other squad members. He had already been informed that this was a one-way mission. Before Vasquez put away his flak jacket, Reese reached into the pocket and pulled out Sarah's picture.

There was nothing about this picture that Reese didn't know, hadn't already committed to memory. He would know Sarah Connor by touch, in the dark. But he looked again, and remembered.

When he headed back into the command room, he was too excited to feel the cold. The other squad members had cleared out – John didn't want to risk any equipment if the displacement unit let out another EMP. They had enough explosives to take out the whole complex, but they would be worth nothing if an EMP wiped them out.

Kyle stepped up to the dais. John stood by the control panel.

“Say it again, Sergeant.”

Kyle faced straight ahead, and recited:

“Thank you, Sarah, for your courage through the dark years. I can't help you with what you must soon face, except to tell you that the future is not set. There is no fate but what we make for ourselves. You must be stronger than you imagine you can be. You must survive, or I will never exist.”

John nodded. Without any more preamble, he headed to the door. Hudson would trigger the displacement from outside.

John Connor stopped on the threshold, and looked back at Reese.

“Good luck, Sergeant Reese. Goodbye.”

He saluted Kyle, who immediately returned the gesture, and stepped into the hallway as the doors closed.

* * *

Kyle is alone in the room. He can't hear much over his pounding heartbeat, so he's not sure what will happen.

And then, it happens.

Bright light.

Pain.

* * *

Sarah was formally discharged two days ago. The doctors need to see more improvement before they'll let Reese leave. So she stays at his bedside, and sleeps in the chair by his bed.

“Kyle, when do I meet John's father?”

A question that Reese has been hoping to avoid, much to his shame. It's true that John never spoke much about his father. But John is 42 in 2027. Kyle doesn't know the exact date, but John will be born some time in 1985.

John's father has just under 10 months to arrive.

“In 2027,” he says, not meeting Sarah's eyes. “John is 42.”

Sarah's brow knits as she does some mental arithmetic.

“Time's running out.”

Kyle sighs.

He never expected to tell Sarah how he felt. Never expected her to kiss him. Of course, he knows why they did. In combat situations, when fear runs high, people yearn to feel close to someone else. He's seen it happen, though he told the truth when he told Sarah it had never happened to him.

Not until that night.

It doesn't change anything for him. He loves Sarah more than he ever though he could.

But he may just have done the terminator's job for it.

* * *

“You should go back to your life, Sarah.”

It's the last day of his hospital stay. The police have been and gone. The doctors have filled him up with every vaccine known to man – on Sarah's orders. His wounds have started to heal.

Sarah doesn't respond. She is standing at the window. Reese's room looks out on the courtyard, where small trees have been planted to give shade for the people who walk there.

“Sarah?”

She turns, and the steady anger in her eyes is enough to shut him up.

“ “It's all gone”, you said. Do you remember that?”

Not his finest hour. Not least because he nearly shot her.

“Do you remember when you told me about the war? About the camps? Humanity on its last legs?”

“I just -”

“You just, nothing!” She stalks over to his bedside and the rage in her eyes makes her look deranged. “Millions will die. My _mother_ is dead. My _best friend_ is dead! There are grieving families out there who have lost people because of _me_ so don't you _dare_ tell me to go back to my life. I have no life, now.”

She falls silent, and turns back towards the window. Kyle is almost afraid to breathe. Eventually the silence is broken by her quiet sobs, and he slips off the bed and goes to her. He turns her gently, so they are face to face, and takes her in his arms. She is stiff, unyielding, at first, and he hates that he did this to her. But there is so much at stake.

Eventually, she relents, and puts her arms around him. Her hands snake under the hem of Kyle's shirt, and caress his skin lightly. There, her fingers drift over the laser burns and battle scars, the way they did the night in the Tiki Motel.

Sarah buries her face in the junction of his neck and shoulder, and with her warm breath ghosting over his skin Kyle feels himself getting hard. In the light cotton clothing the hospital provided, it's fairly obvious, and he tries to put some space between their hips.

“You're the only one,” she murmurs, and lays a gentle kiss on his neck that makes his eyes roll back in his head. He thrusts forward lightly, instinctively, and her hands continue their exploration. He is caressing her too, one hand cupping the nape of her neck as she lays delicate kisses on him, the other hand fast at her waist. Again that feeling of unreality. He feels the weight of years spent shivering in the hopeless cold, with nothing but an image to keep him warm. Now he can feel her warmth and the softness of her skin under his hands.

“You're the only person I have left, Kyle.”

That one line, coupled with her needy, frantic ministrations, is enough to blow Kyle's resolve to smithereens.

He tilts his head down, finds her mouth with his, and crushes her to him desperately. He is greedy with it; having spent so long with Sarah as just a picture, he seems unable to control himself when she is in his arms. He licks into her mouth and trails open-mouthed kisses down her neck, savouring the salt of her skin, the warmth, the reality that is them, together, now. She is everywhere, surrounding him, and he feels almost paralysed with desire.

Sarah is not so conflicted. One hand comes up to his head, fisting in his hair almost to the point of pain. She fumbles sideways and finds the chair beside the bed, the chair where she has slept every night since she was discharged. Too afraid to leave in case Kyle, too, vanished.

She pivots Kyle and sits him down in the chair, fumbling at the button on her jeans. He is still kissing her, reaching up to her, and she melts at his touch. She has never been with someone who shows her this much reverence.

Finally, her jeans are down, panties too, and she straddles Kyle awkwardly in the chair. Her bare cunt brushes against the tent Kyle's cock has made in his pants, and he lets out a moan. She smothers the sound with a kiss. If anything, this excites him more. His hands move frantically, running through her hair one minute and gripping her hips with the next. He pulls her down firmly, inexorably, and the tip of his cock rubs against her swollen clit. But the damn pants are still in the way.

He moves her against him rhythmically and doesn't seem inclined to stop. The friction is teasing both of them, and while Kyle is happy to hover on this precipice Sarah is not. While he mouthes at her, going from neck to lips and back again, she reaches between them and pulls the fabric down. She pushes the waistband down as far as she can and sinks down onto his cock. They take a deep, shuddering breath at the same time, overwhelmed by the sensation.

For Sarah, it's a feeling of fullness, of completion. Kyle is everywhere, and everything.

For Kyle it is rightness, oneness, and it seems to him that she is inside him as much as he is inside her.

He kisses her softly, overcome by the physical sensation. He will never get used to this, not in a hundred years. She is everything.

“I love you, Sarah.” he murmurs, and she whimpers. It's too much stimulation all at once. Too much to _feel_.

“Kyle,” she moans, and he practically growls as he pulls her down onto his cock. He can't thrust – his stitches give him a warning twinge whenever he tries – but he can lift Sarah a little, and pull her closer.

He starts to feel a pressure building in his gut, and it takes a significant amount of willpower to rein it in. Kyle reaches down between their bodies and finds Sarah's clit. At the new stimulation Sarah gasps, and leans forward to catch his mouth in a kiss. He applies gentle, featherlight pressure, barely brushing his fingers against her, matching the rhythm of his thrusts with the stroke of his fingers. She starts to let out breathy, moaning gasps, and Kyle smiles against her neck.

He's always been a quick learner.

The sensation of making love to her is almost overwhelming. He can't get enough of her, can't get enough of the sounds she makes, the feel of her, the taste.

“Don't stop,” Sarah gasps, and Kyle is nothing if not diligent. He keeps up that same steady rhythm, that delicate stroking, until she shudders and falls apart in his arms. The feeling of her warm cunt squeezing around him, of seeing Sarah in such pleasure because of what he did, becomes too much. He presses his face against the crook of her neck and pulls Sarah to him, pulling her onto him so far that he is buried inside her, surrounded by the feel and smell of her, replaying her look of pleasure in his mind.

The end comes suddenly, and waves of pleasure wash through him, over him. Under his hands, Sarah feels warm, solid, and he pulls her close to rest his forehead against hers.

Always, that feeling of disbelief that she is here, that he is here with her.

“Sarah,” he mutters. “I'm yours. Forever.”


	2. Chapter 2

  
They go back to her apartment, first, though Kyle is restless the whole time. The terminator is gone but Kyle is flying blind now, and he thinks that their best option now is to go off the grid as much as possible.

But always, in the back of his mind, there is John. He needs to make sure that Sarah will meet John's father. Even if it means never touching her again.

Pain can be controlled.

* * *

  
The crime scene department have been and gone, but Sarah can still see. Splashes of blood against the walls, on the carpet, where Matt and Ginger were thrown around before dying at the terminator's hands. There is a smell of stale milk in the hallway that mixes horribly with the iron scent of blood.

She won't be repeating the experience at the cabin in Big Bear. She barely knew the place. Her mother bought it as a retirement gift to herself, once Sarah's father died, and Sarah has only visited a handful of times. It was never a home. Not to her. 

Not like this place.

She barely makes it to the bathroom before she vomits, and as her knees hit the linoleum she feels something snap underneath them. Once she has finished retching, she fumbles blindly under her legs to find whatever it is. It's one of Ginger's eyepencils, and that triggers another bout of vomiting.

Midway through hurling, the terrible pain and smell of it all juxtaposed with flashing memories of Ginger, she feels gentle hands scooping her hair back, holding it away from her face. It's Kyle, she knows, but time folds in her mind and it's also Ginger, soothing her after a night out. 

They ended up in a place called Club Tropics, after starting out with tacos and margaritas for dinner. The club was dark, the music loud, and Ginger was giving makeup tips to one of the other girls in the toilets while Sarah peed.

“So you wanna sweep the brush to the corner of your e-. Yeah. You almost got it honey, this isn't the best place for experimentation anyw-!”

From within the cubicle, Sarah heard the main toilet door slam, and smothered a laugh.

“Another failed experiment, kiddo?” she called.

“I don't know. I think it looked good,” Ginger replied. “Dramatic, ya know?”

One Singapore Sling at the bar turned into five, and Sarah lost track of exactly when Matt arrived, but by the end of the night it was just the three of them. In the cab home, Matt sat between them, his arm around Ginger on his right.

“You know what we should do?” he said loudly, drunkenly, and Ginger batted at him to keep it down. “We should fix you up with someone, Connor.”

Sarah, face pressed up against the cab window, only grunted in return. “I'm – hic! – 'kay.” she managed.

“Oh yeah, but it'd be nice to have someone, wouldn't it?”

“Whaddya mean?” she said, and flailed her arm around to pull them both in close. “I have you guys.”

And in the morning, it was Matt who went out for food to soak up their hangovers, while Ginger held back Sarah's hair and told her all about a friend of a friend who would be great for Sarah.

He even owned a Porsche.

* * *

Sarah vomits until her chest is in agony, and then vomits some more. Kyle doesn't say anything or do anything beyond holding back her hair, and once she feels done she slumps on the bathroom floor, where the linoleum is blissfully cool against her cheek.

She lies there gasping, heaving big shuddering breaths, and Kyle gently lets her hair go.

The memories come in a steady stream – dancing in the hallway with Ginger when they signed the lease, bringing Pugsly home, eating takeout with Matt and Ginger while watching TV. A whole life, just gone.

Sarah succumbs to her tears.

* * *

By the time they're ready to leave, it's nearly night. There's a hotel down the road where they'll spend the night.

Sarah is pulling Matt's spare clothes out of Ginger's wardrobe for Kyle when the voicemail system beeps.

“Hello?”

Ginger's voice echoes through the apartment, bringing with it a fresh stab of pain to Sarah.

“Hahaha, fooled you...”

She tosses the clothes onto Ginger's bed and picks her way out into the living room. Kyle is standing above the machine, face grim, and Sarah almost smiles at the look of naked mistrust on his face. 

“Sarah? Dan Morsky here. God, I hope you're alright. I saw on the news that... Anyway. I hope you're OK. Call me, if you need anything. Bye.”

She raises her eyebrows. Dan Morsky was the last person she expected to hear from after all this. She'd almost forgotten he existed.

“Who...” Kyle's voice is rough, and he has to cough to clear his throat. “Who was that?”

“His name is Dan. We're – we were – dating. We were meant to go out on the Friday you found me in Tech Noir.”

Kyle absorbs this, still staring at the answering machine warily like it's going to become a terminator and gun them both down.

“Are you ready?” He asks.

“Nearly.”

An old boyfriend of Ginger's bought her a gun, once. Sarah finds it on a shelf in Ginger's wardrobe, along with a box of bullets. She adds these to her bag, before she leaves the apartment.

**Author's Note:**

> This is very much a WIP! Please subscribe if you would like to read further chapters but I'm afraid I cannot promise speed or quality...

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [REDUX: tonight, it's only you and me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27608578) by [the_sound_of_inevitability](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_sound_of_inevitability/pseuds/the_sound_of_inevitability)




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